Have you noticed? Sometimes it’s the details that set one house in Pittsburg apart from another and make it more desirable.

Those appealing details can:
Increase the selling price
Cause the home to sell faster
Here are several upgrades that will make your house more attractive to potential buyers – each costing less than $500. (Unless you’re a do-it-yourselfer, add the cost of installation):

Repaint or Replace the front door and/or entry hardware.
Since your front entry is the first thing buyers see when they approach the house, it makes the first impression. Doors come in a wide range of styles and prices, with a good variety available for less than $300. Keyed entry hardware comes in some eye-catching styles for under $150, and you can upgrade to a keyless (digital) entry for less than $200.

Replace the light fixture at your front entry.
If you’ve still got one of those old round-glass bug-catchers, replace it with something classy for under $50.

Install a programmable thermostat
Most people are energy conscious these days, so a programmable thermostat has great appeal. Tech-smart buyers will especially like a Wi-Fi enabled thermostat that allows them to control the temperature from their car or office. 7-day programmable thermostats with Wi-Fi run between $100 and $200.

Upgrade the fixtures and hardware in kitchen or bath.
You may not be able to afford new cabinetry in the kitchen or bath, but you can give the existing cabinets a new, fresh look with new door and drawer pulls, and new faucets.

Consider replacing your kitchen faucet with one of the new models with a spray head – it’s a convenience most love, and you’ll find a good selection for less than $150. If you want to make an even bigger impression – replace the old sink with one that has no wear marks. These are also available for under $200.

Bathroom vanity faucets run from $30 to as much as $300 for designer styles.

Lighting fixtures are also inexpensive and can give a whole new look to a room. You can replace that dated “round bulb” light bar over the bathroom vanity with a stylish fixture for less than $100.

Replace the toilet – or just the seat.
If you’ve scrubbed the old toilet so many times that it never quite sparkles, consider replacing it. New toilets run from $100 to $300, while replacement toilet seats cost less than $30.

If you’re handy, you could make every improvement mentioned here for an investment of less than $1,300. Would it be worth it to cause your home to sell faster, and for more money?

When you’re getting ready to make upgrades prior to selling and wondering where you should spend your dollars, give me a call. I’ll be glad to share my knowledge of our local market and tell you what today’s Pittsburg home buyers want most.

In this post we summarize monthly real estate trends across five categories of single-family homes in Pittsburg, California. All condos, two bedroom detached homes, three bedroom detached homes, four bedroom detached homes, and five plus bedroom detached homes. Here we capture trends in the local Pittsburg market, as compared to larger state and nation wide trends.

In January we observed slight increases in sold home prices of both four and five-plus bedroom homes from December 2015. The sold home price of two bedroom homes showed the largest decline, with a 12.8% decrease in price. Condos and five-plus bedroom homes showed the lowest number of homes sold, with one home sold in each category. Both three and four bedroom homes showed the highest numbers of homes sold, with 18 three bedroom homes sold and 14 four bedroom homes sold in January.

Below are a series of figures indicating the trends in median home price for each category.

***Please note, zero values indicate no sales for that month, and do not represent a median home price of zero dollars. These figures reflect data that is currently available. There may be slight changes in these, due to late reporting of sales***

Figure 1. Median sold prices of homes in Pittsburg California during the month of January 2016

Figure 2 Percent change calculated from median home prices in December of 2015 and January of 2016. The trend direction of the percent change in median home prices is indicated with +/- sign. In instances where no sales data were available the % change was omitted from the table, as % change cannot be calculated properly with a base of zero.

Figure 3. Number of properties sold in January and Year to Date, listed in the corresponding columns.

Figure 4. On the Y-axis we feature the median sold prices of homes in Pittsburg, CA in US dollars. On the X-axis we feature 5 categories of single-family homes that we featured in our analysis.

Figure 5. Median sold prices of all condominiums in Pittsburg, CA in US dollars, in January of 2016.

Figure 6. Median sold prices of two bedroom detached homes in Pittsburg, CA in US dollars, in January of 2016.

Figure 7. Median sold prices of three bedroom detached homes in Pittsburg, CA in US dollars, in January of 2016.

Figure 8. Median sold prices of four bedroom detached homes in Pittsburg, CA in US dollars, in January of 2016.

Figure 9. Median sold prices of five plus bedroom detached homes in Pittsburg, CA in US dollars, in January of 2016.